Tuesday, January 30, 2007

Climb every mountain, scale every firewall

Today is my last day at the old interwebs company. Apparently, I did my job so well that I thought of too many ideas for our programmers and I have proven myself to be too intelligent for content management. Who cares how intelligent I am? I need the money. Damn me and my big brain and my big mouth for showing off at every unwitting turn. This is my first time getting fired from a job because I was too smart for my own good. At least my boss bought some Red Bull for me because he kept drinking mine from the fridge. That's my consolation prize for losing my 2 day a week brain-free job...a 4 pack of Red Bull with one missing.
I'll miss spending time with my coworkers, who come up with such gems as "we are from the tribe suckacock" and "mobgolians: we can scale any fire wall." I'm listening to Eli laugh his dirty old man from Brooklyn laugh as he listens to streaming comedy online and Steve is grumbling about how our phone site isn't working and randomly giggling, Clint is stoic as usual and Sheiva is now asking a question about a comment she designed. Soon I'll leave here for the last time and relinquish my ideal parking spot for my Saturday tutoring lessons.
I want a boyfriend to take up my remaining free time and give me back massages. Mainly, I just want someone to give me back massages, preferably while exchanging witty commentary. I met two interesting guys this weekend and given my luck, they are probably carrying on a torrid hipster writer affair with each other and only talked to me for their own deranged amusement. Aside from having delusional fantasies like the one above and the desire for back massages, I am actually rather happy being single for the first time since I've been back in LA. Prior to now, I wasn't driving myself crazy with activities like I am now so I felt the need to make boys my activity. Now, I have my music, a new band, school and tutoring. I'm excited to be losing this job simply to gain sleep.
On an unrelated note, I am very proud of myself for clearing up that entire brake light ticket incident in court yesterday. I managed to dodge more than $1000 in bail and fines by pointing out that I had a piece of paper that said that the violations on my ticket had been cleared. IN AUGUST OF LAST YEAR. Who doesn't love Kafka-esque experiences...and ellipses...and self conscious writing styles...

Friday, January 26, 2007

High Sugar Content

Anyone who knows me well (or at all) knows my passion for dessert. Come on, I named my BLOG after my favorite dessert. I am a huge sucker for sugar. this comes directly from my mother, who is the only person I have ever known to surpass me in her quest for tasty sugary goodness. Witness, last night...
My mom was over at my apartment and about to leave when we decided to take out the recycling. She noticed a big white box in my fridge and asked if we should take it down. To my horror, I realized that I'd entirely forgotten an entire slice of pecan pie from Thanksgiving. Being that the pie was now several months old, I was afraid to open the box. My mom, brave soul, that she is, couldn't wait to see it. We peered in and surprisingly, it looked like ordinary pecan pie. There was no mold, no weird smell, nothing. Just preternaturally preserved pie.
"Honey, will you get me a spoon?" was my mother's request.
I shot my mom a look of horror and then watched as she chiseled away at the caramelized exterior of the slice, revealing the mysteriously still gooey filling.
She managed to scoop out a bite and put it in her mouth as I watched with rapt attention. She chewed it for a bit and didn't fall over dead.
"You should really try some," she said, "It's still really good...it tastes just like it did at Thanksgiving!"
After I prodded it with my spoon for a bit to prove it wasn't showing signs of life, I tried one of the pecans on top. It DID taste normal and just as good as it had months ago. I passed the spoon back to my mom and she ate the majority of the slice as we tried to figure out what on earth could preserve it for that long. I had another few bites but really left the major work to my mom, who was much more gung ho about the pie and apparently has no fear of food poisoning.
The empty pie tin is now soaking in my sink before I return it to Sweet Lady Janes from whence it came in November. I'm not sure which will be more surprising to them...the return of the errant pie tin or the shocking shelf life of their pie...or perhaps the insanity that would inspire not one but TWO people to eat the pie that time forgot.

Tuesday, January 23, 2007

The restaurant told me I was the sexiest

Being a tutor, I often find myself in the homes of the fantastically wealthy and delusional. Though wealth and insanity are not intrinsically linked, it appears that extreme wealth drastically increases one's chance of being insane. This is likely due to the fact having that much money gives people the ability to alter their reality and thus live in their very own version, which is drastically different from the world that most of us dub real. By definition, this would make them psychotic which isn't usually far from the truth.
I was tutoring last night in Bel Air with a child that I shall call Spoiled Unintentional Humor Boy. See, I actually like this kid because within 10 minutes of our first lesson, he asked if he could study money in college so he could inherit his dad's business. Sure, he may only be 10, but at least the kid has aspirations to earn more money than anyone could ever need on top of a trust fund and perpetuate his status as the rich and pampered. He also informed me that the plastic psychic at a restaurant told him that without a doubt, he was the sexiest, and that explains why the girls in his class all have crushes on him. He has a crush on just one though, because he's "not a player." I informed him that he wasn't a player because he was 10. Details.
After my lesson with him, his mother came in the room with an exotic parrot on her shoulder named Ruby. She then asked if I would like to have Ruby on my shoulder and I thought hey, why not, the worst that could happen is that I lose an eye. After having Ruby comfortably perched on my shoulder for a few minutes, I felt a light peck on my cheek.
"Oh, she's hungry!" saud Ruby's owner.
Well, ok, that makes sense, birds get hungry. I asked for a piece of bread and tore off a chunk to give to Ruby.
"You have to chew it first a little bit" my student's mother suggested.
Ok, chewing I can do. I went to take the now soggy and smashed piece of bread out of my mouth when the mom stoppped me by saying,
"Just hold it out on your tongue, she'll take it from you. She's very gentle and it's a great experience."
I'm not sure what types of experiences this woman had had in the past but birds pecking masticated food off her tongue was apparently high on her list of things to do. I was caught between being rude (keeping the bread to myself) or being weird (feeding a bird with my tongue). I decided to compromise and held the bread between my teeth, praying for the best.
Ruby sweetly took the soaked bread with his beak and went to work on it, still happily perched upon my shoulder. Her owner beamed at me and told me that she enjoyed having such a bonding experience with her pet.
This is the kind of thing that really wealthy people do...they ask their child's tutor to feed their parrot with her tongue. This is the sort of thing that no reasonable person would ask but hey, if you are wealthy enough to own an exotic bird and have the time to train it to eat out of your mouth, this sort of request seems entirely normal. I have another lesson with this kid tonight and I pray that Ruby stays in her cage. There are certain things I like in my mouth and a parrot beak isn't one of them.

Tuesday, January 16, 2007

Don't ever go away from here

Being alone in the office makes me want to dance and sing and cartwheel across the drab floor to Now It's Overhead. I'd be my own indie circus and spectacle for no one to see but these walls would know. These strange white walls with their ugly paintings and scattered straps bolted to the wall, they've been around for each business that has passed through, each set of clacking keyboards, each phone call to Mr. So and So. The tin of Christmas popcorn is still sitting in the kitchen and I want to throw it over my head like confetti. I wonder if we ever grow up and if we do, what it feels like.

Monday, January 15, 2007

The return of the lazy blogette

Sitting at work feels rather futile. I'm being paid to cruise around the internet and think of things that other people would enjoy seeing on the internet. We don't have enough programmers in the office to possibly create all of my inane ideas (like a fortune cookie widget) nd so my hours get cut to two days of doing...the same thing I do at home when I'm not practicing or doing homework. The difference is that at work, I vocalize my weird ideas that people would enjoy instead of say, staring at the wall and thinking about them to my heart's content.
Things the internet needs more of in my opinion:
*Music filter - you put in the kind of music you like and it filters your friend requests on myspace to weed out that morons who email you with their heinous songs and expect you to love them
*John Krasinski - like Zack Braff, but not an idiot. He has yet to make a movie that panders to faux indie hipsters and so I like him better. Plus, he's tall, so as my friend Jake pointed out, if we had babies they'd average out to normal size. I should totally say this to him if we ever meet. I should also tell him about my dream that involved him and a flame thrower.
*People who love me - based on statistical research (ie pure self serving extrapolation) there should be people on the internet who love me. These people should read my journal and buy my songs like there is no tomorrow because I'm that amazing.
*Fortune cookie messages- seriously. I am going to make my company make these things. Don't say I didn't warn you.
In good news, I have ben actively picking up new tutoring clients. In bad news, one of them has already called me 3 times today and only wants to pay me $20 an hour. Things could be worse. It could be like the family that didn't pay me for 4 months. I should stop bitching about families not paying me exhorbitant amounts of money but it makes me angry that I worked for $21 an hour for *unspecified tutoring company* and they in fact charged $130 an hour. $130??! And I saw $21??? NOT COOL.
I've decided that I want a nerdy boyfriend again. I keep meeting these awesome guys by complete accident and then not following up really or writing them and then not hearing back or you know...hiding my face in a book when they are trying to talk to me at a coffee shop. I want someone to cater to my random thoughts and desire for snuggling in cold weather, who will make fun of me while worshipping the ground I walk on. I'm going through a bratty phase and frankly I want someone to indulge me so I can be level headed while working and going to school.
Ok internet, I think this is your cue to bring me John Krasinski. Now.